Surprised Ginger Kitten Cross Stitch Pattern

About this cat cross stitch pattern

A ginger kitten with a cream face and chest sits up straight, eyes wide, mouth open in an “oh!”, with both front paws lifted to its chest. Its eyes are huge and blue with white sparkles, a little star of light glints above one of them, and its long whiskers stick out on both sides. A fluffy striped tail curls up behind it.

The expression is the whole joke, so it works as a reaction picture for a kitchen, a desk or a friend who’s always shocked by something. For a calmer cat, the Tabby Cat with a Ball of Yarn is the same size; our cat round-up and funny cross stitch round-up have more.

What you need

• Fabric: 14-count Aida in white, cut to at least 12“ x 13“ (3“ around the design for hooping and framing).
• Thread: 24 DMC colors, about 24 skeins in total, stitched with two strands. The main colors are 939 Navy Blue – Very Dark (1,212 stitches), 3854 Autumn Gold – Medium (967) and 951 Tawny – Light (897).
• Needle: a size 24 tapestry needle.
• Stitches: full cross stitches only, with no backstitch.

Difficulty and stitching time

It’s rated Intermediate for its eyes: each one uses several blues and white in a small area, and they have to match. The rest is broad orange and cream. At 4,555 stitches it takes roughly 46 to 76 hours at a steady 60 to 100 stitches an hour, and about 40% of the fabric stays bare.

Tips for stitching this pattern

• Use the navy outline as your guide. 939 Navy Blue – Very Dark (1,212 stitches) outlines the kitten, the whiskers and the pupils. It’s darker than it looks on the card, so double-check you haven’t picked up a black.
• Stitch both eyes in the same sitting. The blues and the white sparkle (B5200 Snow White, 80 stitches) are placed stitch by stitch. Doing the second eye straight after the first, from the same thread lengths, keeps them identical.
• Separate the two oranges. 3854 Autumn Gold – Medium (967 stitches) and 3853 Autumn Gold – Dark (673) make the fur and its stripes. Fill the lighter one first, leaving the stripe squares empty, then add the darker stripes.

Size, fabric and framing

On 14-count Aida the finished design measures 5.9“ x 6.6“ (15.0 x 16.8 cm). On 16-count it comes out at 5.2“ x 5.8“, and on 18-count at 4.6“ x 5.1“. An 8“ x 10“ frame leaves room for a mat.

It also makes a good 7“ hoop for a kitchen or a desk.

What’s in the free PDF

• A cover page and a one-page overview with a preview of the design
• The chart, split across as many printable pages as you choose, in color or black and white, with a symbol for every DMC color, center lines, a mini-map showing which part of the design each page covers and a color key on every page
• The thread list: DMC number, color name, number of stitches and skeins to buy for each color
• The finished size on 11-, 14-, 16-, 18- and 28-count Aida